Archive for the ‘Church History’ Category
Posted on March 19, 2010 - by Admin1
Face the Future
By Kevin Riggs
“At 7:30 o’clock Tuesday evening, November 5, 1935, in Cofer’s Chapel Church, Nashville, Tennessee, the National Association of Free Will Baptists convened in its first session. After a lively devotional service of songs and prayer . . .the organization of the association was deferred until Wednesday afternoon in order to give all delegates ample time to arrive and take part.”1
Those are the opening paragraphs of the first minutes of the National Association of Free Will Baptists. (more…)
Posted on March 19, 2010 - by Admin1
What is a Free Will Baptist?
By Kevin Riggs
I was on the first intercollegiate basketball team at Free Will Baptist Bible College. As we traveled around the country we never knew how we were going to be received by the other school or described by the local newspaper. After all, very few people outside of denominational circles knew what a “Free Will Baptist” was. On one occasion, we went to Knoxville, TN, to play Johnson Bible College. The following day’s headline in the local paper read, “Free Wheel College Defeats Johnson.” On another occasion, we were “Freewill Baptist Barber College.” (more…)
Posted on March 19, 2010 - by Admin1
Who are Free Will Baptists?
By Kevin Riggs
As a fourth-generation Free Will Baptist minister, I have been asked to write a series of three articles about our denomination’s heritage. My intention is to answer three questions: (1) Who are we? (2) What are we? (3) Where are we going? (more…)
Posted on March 9, 2010 - by Admin1
The Reforming Power of Expository Preaching (Part 5)
By Randy Sawyer
The Reformation Age was an era in which a recovery of preaching brought about the theological reform and ecclesiastical renewal. And it was indeed the recovery of expositional preaching that served to fuel the reformed project. As the late Middle Ages wound to a close, Europe was suffering from severe famine. But it was “Not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord” (Amos 8:11).
Form and shadow had replaced substance and heart. The need of the hour was for a “voice crying in the wilderness.” Into that void stepped the reformers, men committed, above all else, to heralding the Word of the living God; men like Wyclif, Huss, Luther, Zwingli and Calvin. (more…)
Posted on March 5, 2010 - by Admin1
The Reforming Power of Expository Preaching (Part 4)
By Randy Sawyer
Of all the notable preachers of the era, perhaps the greatest Bible expositor of the Reformation was John Calvin. In lectures on the History of Preaching, John Broadus suggests that “Calvin gave the ablest, soundest, clearest expositions of scripture that had been for a thousand years.” J. I. Packer said, “He was in fact, the finest exegete, the greatest systematic theologian, and the profoundest thinker that the Reformation produced.” (more…)
Posted on March 5, 2010 - by Admin1
The Reforming Power of Expository Preaching (Part 3)
By Randy Sawyer
Standing under the shadows of Martin Luther and John Calvin, Ulrich Zwingli has been called ”the third man of the Reformation.” (more…)
Posted on March 4, 2010 - by Admin1
The Reforming Power of Expository Preaching (Part 2)
By Randy Sawyer
In order to understand the Reforming Power of Expository Preaching, we must trace the Reformation to the personal experience of the monk who shook the world from his lonely study in Wittenberg. Born in Saxony in 1483, Martin Luther has been called the Father of the Protestant Reformation. He was educated as a loyal member of the medieval Roman Catholic Church and became a monk and a priest. (more…)
Posted on March 4, 2010 - by Admin1
The Reforming Power of Expository Preaching (Part 1)
By Randy Sawyer
The church of the Middle Ages was a massive and powerful institution. The pope, as supreme authority in Christendom, exercised a moral rule over both ecclesiastical and political matters. The church buildings and the services held in them were very similar everywhere. The universal use of Latin facilitated communication, and the laity as well as the clergy were deeply devoted to the dogma that had evolved over the previous centuries. (more…)
